Democracy Be Damned: South American Oligarchies Enabled by US Corporate Elites

The linked article below from Salon.com, by Ben Norton sheds light on a common activity of the Global & US corporate elite. Around the world, but particularly in South America, they consistently, quickly and quietly encourage the replacement of thriving democracies with oligarchy. Stories abound and too often the US government appears to be supporting if not directly involved in these actions.

Norton quotes The Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald as saying “Brazilian financial and media elites are pretending that corruption is the reason for removing the twice-elected president of the country as they conspire to install and empower the country’s most corrupted political figures.” He goes on to add that they are trying to remove “from power a moderately left-wing government that won four straight elections in the name of representing the country’s poor, and are literally handing control over the Brazilian economy (the world’s seventh largest) to Goldman Sachs and bank industry lobbyists.”

The real problem here is why haven’t we heard of this? Brazil is a large country, “5th largest by population worldwide” so where has the coverage been? As here in the US, “Brazil’s media outlets are overwhelmingly controlled by right-wing corporate elites”. Telling this story is not in their best interests. No, in this case they are all “pushing for the impeachment”. The powerful oligarchs have a candidate in mind and more important, policies that will benefit (guess who?) the wealthy. Policies like “implement(ing) austerity measures and install(ing the) chair of Goldman Sachs in Brazil, Paulo Leme, as the head of the central bank.”

If completed, as planned, democracy is once again stifled, wealthy are placed in power and the people have little or no say. What should make all of us in the US so irate is that we very quietly, enable this entire process to go on, instead of being a champion for the people and democracy in Brazil.

Read Norton’s entire article as well as checking out the link to Greenwald’s article.